Housing Starts: Cuomo’s Housing Pledge I Boroughs Outpace Manhattan I Generation Y Prefer Suburbs

Photo by Bloomberg News

1. Cuomo Announces $486M Affordable Housing Investment Governor Andrew Cuomo said in his State of the State speech today that New York will invest $486 million to help build and preserve low-cost housing in the state. About $257 million of those funds would come out of the state’s share of a $13 billion settlement with JPMorgan Chase over mortgage-bond sales, he said. The New York State Association for Affordable Housing gave the governor’s agenda its seal of approval. ‘Today, the Governor demonstrated his understanding that the development and preservation of affordable housing are critical to building strong communities throughout New York State,’ said a spokesperson for the influential trade group, which represents affordable housing developers. Some tenant advocates, however, highlighted the fact that Cuomo made no reference to rent-stabilization laws. [The Real Deal – 01/21/15]
2. Outer Boroughs Outpace Manhattan, Report Says In Manhattan, Hudson Yards and the blocks around the High Line have been hot in recent years. Rents as well as land prices have soared, but according to a new poll of New York City real estate executives, those looking for the next hot spots would be well advised to turn their attention to Queens and the Bronx—or better yet, Brooklyn.  In fact, nearly 70% of 40 top executives at commercial and residential development firms and brokerages of various sizes in the city put Brooklyn on the list of areas poised for growth, according to a survey released Wednesday by accounting firm Anchin Block & Anchin. The survey, among other questions, asked executives to rate growth prospects in the four outer boroughs alongside those in six specific Manhattan neighborhoods, from downtown to midtown. Queens came out just a few percentage points behind Brooklyn, with nearly 66% of executives placing the borough among their top picks. [Crain’s New York Business – 01/21/15]
3. Generation Y Prefers Suburban Home Over City Condo One of the hottest debates among housing economists these days isn’t the trajectory of home sales, but whether millennials, those born in the 1980s and 1990s, want to remain urbanites or eventually relocate to the suburbs. Some demographers and economists argue that the preference of millennials, also called Generation Y, for city living will remain long lasting. And surveys of these young urban residents have tended to show that they don’t mind small living quarters as long as they have access to mass transit and are close to entertainment, dining and their workplaces. But a survey released Wednesday by the National Association of Home Builders, a trade group, suggested otherwise. [Wall Street Journal – 01/21/15]
4. Super-Luxury Condo Glut Seen as Overblown Forget about that widely predicted glut of ultra-luxury apartments—a new report by residential brokerage firm Halstead Property Development Marketing suggests the number of super-lux units set to hit the Manhattan market this year could well be overblown. In recent weeks, year-end residential reports from a number of leading residential brokerages projected that 6,500 condos would be delivered to the market this year, most of them part of a wave of high-end luxury construction. But Stephen Kliegerman, an executive at Halstead who oversees the firm’s efforts at marketing and selling newly built condo units, estimated that only about 3,500 of those units will actually be up for sale in the next 11 months. That’s because nearly half of the new units, 3,000 of them in fact, are already spoken for. [Crain’s New York Business – 01/21/15]
5. Resurgent Housing Seen Cushioning U.S. From World Woes Mortgage rates near record lows, an improving job market and gradually easing credit standards will converge to make it the best year for home construction since 2007, say economists including Mark Zandi, who has testified to Congress on the topic. That will help the economy weather slowing global demand for U.S. exports and a drop in energy prices that is curbing purchases of oilfield equipment, he said. ‘Housing will be pivotal to growth this year and next,’ said Zandi, chief economist at West Chester, Pennsylvania-based Moody’s Analytics Inc. ‘Stronger housing is needed to offset the ill effects of a deteriorating trade balance and less investment in energy. [Bloomberg News – 01/22/15]
6. Queens Tops Charts for NYC Construction Permits in 2014 In 2014, Queens was issued the highest number of full-building demolition and new building permits, according to New York City Department of Buildings data provided to Commercial Observer. The data showed that Queens obtained 643 new building permits and 575 full building demolition permits last year. This is an increase from 2013, when the borough was issued 593 new building permits and 510 full demolition permits. [Commercial Observer – 01/20/15]
7. Bill Would Force Landlords to Pay for Displaced Tenants’ Temporary Shelter Landlords of unsafe buildings could be forced to pay for displaced tenants’ temporary housing while their apartments are being fixed under proposed legislation in the City Council. Councilwoman Margaret Chin is renewing her push for the bill, which was introduced last year, in the hopes of making it easier for New Yorkers to find temporary housing after their homes are vacated by the city for falling into disrepair. [DNAinfo – 01/21/15]
8. MAP: See Planned Affordable Housing Developments Popping Up in the Bronx Hundreds of new affordable housing units slated for construction over the next few years in the Bronx will cater to tenants ranging from artists to veterans to the homeless. The economic development group SoBRO is spearheading new developments in neighborhoods from Mott Haven to Belmont to help the borough prosper. ‘We encourage a mix of housing options but maintain that housing must remain affordable for Bronxites,’ said SoBRO President Phillip Morrow in a statement. ‘This housing creates communities where residents can live, work, and thrive — building a better Bronx. [DNAinfo – 01/21/15]
9. City Council Really Hates Airbnb, Wants More Oversight After yesterday’s contentious eight-hour City Council hearing about illegal hotels, one thing is very clear: city lawmakers do not like Airbnb. The point of the hearing was to discuss New York’s short term rental laws and illegal hotels, but Airbnb, a popular rental website, became the focus of the criticism. Over the last year, Airbnb has been lobbying to get New York to change its short term rental laws, which make it illegal for someone to rent out their apartment for less than 30 days. At the same time, the anti-Airbnb crowd has been growing (several lawsuits have been filed), and last October, New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman issued a report that found that 3/4 of all Airbnb listings were illegal. [Curbed NY – 01/21/15]
10. Supersizing Manhattan: New Yorkers Rage Against the Dying of the Light On his terrace overlooking Central Park, a friend who is a wealthy tutoring entrepreneur is pointing. ‘The Nordstrom Tower – we think that’s going to be the one,’ he says, indicating the site at 225 West 57th Street, where a condo tower is rising to a height of 1770 feet. He means the one that will finally block his view of the Empire State Building, the most famous skyscraper in the world. [The Guardian – 01/16/15]